Attornies are not typically used with home sales here in the West. In
fact, I even called an attorney a couple of months ago to represent me
at the closing. He said, in essence, the job wasn't worth it to him for
the small amount he could reasonably charge. He also said that the
escrow company has a duty to make sure that everything is taken care
of, and they're not going to up and flee the country just for the
amount of money they could get by not paying off my loan.

This morning the buyer sent a man with a bulldozer out to clear the
creosote bushes off the property. I left a message with the escrow
company (it was pretty early) and called my lender, who told me the
loan was NOT paid off and they had no information about any impending
payoff.

If my loan in fact does get paid off and I get the rest of the money
I'm not going to try to undo it, but until that happens I've heard a
lot of reassurances from this buyer with nothing substantial behind
them.

Ed